Boom!

Hello, I'm Julia Child.

Welcome to my house.

What fun we're going to have baking all kinds of incredible cakes, pies and breads right here in my own kitchen.

Mas Markus Farbinger,thor master teacher at the Culinary Institute of America loved eating warm poppy seed tortes with poached apricots when he was growing up in Austria.

Learn how to make this Viennese specialty on...

This dark beauty is a Viennese pastry special and pastry chef Markus Farbinger is going to tell us a little bit about its history.

Yes-- it's interesting.

Vienna in the 1850s, 1900 was real melting pot.

It was like a little America.

Uh-huh.

And lots of cultures-- north, south, east, west-- joined in and created this kind of... culture gastronomic culture as well as political and artistic cultures.

And the poppy seed is at home in Turkey and the Middle East and always grown in north, in Denmark, for example and it's a rather unusual ingredient.

It's very strong, peculiar taste.

And we're going to make it from the bottom up.

Yeah-- so, if we start out with poaching our apricots because we can do that ahead of time.

And before we poach the apricots we want to skin them.

Depending how ripe they are, it depends how long one has to keep it in the water.

And one should try it out first with one before one goes on and throws the whole bunch in there.

We also have prepared ice water to stop the cooking process, so we're not poaching it in water.

Okay, we shock it.

Of course, one can do a couple at a time... Yeah.

But, uh... and it peels off quite nicely.

That comes off beautifully.

Very similar to peeling tomatoes.

Mm-hmm.

And you do peaches the same way.

Peaches... yes.

And the apricots then are poached in a syrup.

The syrup is made out of three cups of water one and a half cups of sugar.

For flavor we put in the half vanilla bean.

We're not so much interested in the seeds so we're not slicing it open.

We just want the flavor.

And we also put in a good wedge of... of ginger.

Ginger, yes.

And for that flavor... it's nice because... vanilla is a cream flavor, or... we like to call it a cream flavor a cream addition when you make fruits.

And the ginger is... supports fruit flavor so we have different levels of flavors.

People really don't use enough ginger, I think and it's so good.

And it's a wonderful thing for almost every fruit because it brings out the flavor itself without being too dominant.

So, we bring that to a boil.

So, now the syrup has come to a full boil and... it already smells wonderful.

Mmm-- it does.

And we reduce it at this point to not even have bubbles, really.

Just...

I call it almost more steaming because if it's too hot the fruit will kind of get really...

Disintegrate, yeah.

Yes, it will disintegrate on the outside and... Those really do look ripe.

These are the first ripe ones I've seen this season.

Okay, we leave it on very low heat and making sure that it never comes to a boil.

I will watch it.

And watch it carefully.

Like a good... And we put on the lid.

We keep it there, yeah.

After that we make now the batter.

Mm-hmm.

We start out with two sticks of butter.

They're already nice and soft so I don't think we have to break them up much.

Unsalted butter.

We cream that just a little bit.

Just to break it up nicely.

And with our seven tablespoons of powdered sugar.

That would be one cup minus one tablespoon.

Minus... ( laughing ) Big math class.

It might be easier to put it in than take out one tablespoon you think, for measuring?

Probably.

Okay, and also at this point besides the sugar we're adding one tablespoon of cinnamon for flavoring and we zest our lemon.

And very important when zesting the lemon only the yellow outside.

Mm-hmm.

Because the white... is the bitter part.

And we don't want too much bitterness.

We can see that we really only scraped off the yellow and it's still yellow-- there's no white parts around.

And... we certainly can bounce it a little bit and... You've got a toothbrush.

Yes, a toothbrush, it's a new one, though.

( laughing ) It's a new way of doing it.

Cleans it wonderfully.

Do you use that for anything else?

Yeah, for brushing teeth.

( laughs ) ( laughing quietly ) Okay.

Good, and so we cream it.

And again, it's very important not to rush it much.

If the speed is too high, the friction creates temperature and then it starts to deflate or lose the air.

At medium speed, it will create nice aeration.

And we also add the yolks, which we're going to separate.

We have seven eggs.

Getting all of that white out you're not wasting anything.

So we have a little accident here with our... A little bit of shell.

...shell out.

Better shell than yolk, isn't it?

Absolutely.

Like catching a frog-- very difficult.

So... when the butter and the sugar and the spices are blended together well... we kind of scrape down... the bowl.

We can add two of the yolks, okay.

And we beat it again.

Now we can see if the apricots... going, yes, that's perfectly fine.

Just a few, very small bubbles, steam.

We can poke them and we can see the knife comes up very easily, there's really no resistance.

But just leave them covered and they continue to poach a little bit on the side.

Mm-hmm.

Add two more yolks.

Maybe...

I stop it for a moment because I think that's a very important part of the creaming process is you can see the liquid of the yolks and the butter don't really always come together.

That means that the butter is too cold Oh.

and also the eggs were a little cold.

So together they sort of start to separate.

So we need to bring the temperature up and that's very easily done by putting it on the fire for a moment and just help it out a little bit.

And see, just... And that's immediately creaming it.

Just warm it up a little bit to melt it a little bit further so that it can incorporate the maximum air.

Yeah.

You melted it quite a bit there.

Yeah, it's...

I think it will come together.

So, you can see already it's coming together and it's going to be smooth.

This now is... Now, how do we tell it's ready?

It's very creamy, it's fluffy.

Oh, yes, it is very creamy yes, that's lovely.

It's a little dull.

That's very important.

If it's too shiny...

If it's too shiny, that means that it melted too much, we worked it too much or the temperature in the room was too high.

We can transfer this now into a glass bowl.

We can get ready for our meringue.

That is a lovely color, isn't it?

And I guess that's the cinnamon.

It's light, but still it doesn't run, it's still... Lovely.

Okay, some of the other ingredients that we have to prepare are cake crumbs.

Cake crumbs, that's a nice idea.

They can be things like ladyfingers cookies, graham crackers.

If they're nice and dry... they grind nicely through the strainer.

Yeah.

The food processor will also do the job.

Mm-hmm-- about how much do you need, Markus?

One and a third... One and third cups?

Yes, okay... Another part of the dry ingredients are the poppy seeds.

And it's... they're like blue.

Some people also call them gray poppy seeds.

And what makes them so blue are the shells are still on.

One also can buy a yellow or brown poppy seed which is a little milder.

So we grind them up in a coffee grinder... it's very effective.

And it's kind of... it's ready when it stops moving.

It's good to have a little coffee grinder just for spices anyway, isn't it?

Yes, very good.

Yeah.

Fresh ground spices always... much more fragrant and flavorful.

And you can see that it's ground up.

It's really like a very fine coffee.

Yes, and it's actually used... poppy seed is used in India for... to thicken sauces and soups.

Ah, oh.

It's a thickening agent as well as a flavoring agent.

Maybe, truly if you want to help me, I'll sift while you grind.

Okay.

Think that's enough?

Yeah.

It's good, yeah, you can see it's a little oily.

And that's the reason why we have to sift it through.

Because the oil starts to come out and it would create lumps.

Those poppy seeds...

I never have used poppy seed before.

It's not used that often.

No... and should be.

I'll do that for you.

We have two and a quarter... quarter cups of poppy seeds.

This is very interesting as a mixture.

Yes, so these are our sifted... sifted dry ingredients.

So, either we have a clean bowl... from the clean one bowl from before.

Clean bowl and a clean beater.

And we add our seven egg whites from before.

How much sugar now?

And we have seven tablespoons of sugar.

There are different schools of thought on what we do with egg whites and sugar.

Some people like to whip it beforehand Mm-hmm.

I tend to throw it in right away.

As long as there's not too much sugar.

If it's a lot of sugar it's better to do it in stages but that is just fine.

Just stir it up a little bit so the sugar doesn't sink to the bottom and will cake up.

This is going to be just a meringue mixture?

Just a simple meringue.

It kind of replaces our baking powder our chemical leavening.

Yes, good, yeah.

Natural leavening.

And again we start up with medium speed to loosen the eggs and then we finish off in high speed.

And very important-- only soft to medium peaks.

Not stiff ones-- we only do that when we're making a meringue as a finished product.

I made a common mistake that happens.

What?

Ah... having not all the tools ready before the mix is ready.

So quickly, we have to prepare our pans.

It's best to do that always beforehand.

And a handy tool is a spray a vegetable spray.

It's very quick.

With a French knife, we turn the cake pan around and take a parchment paper and with the back of the knife... we kind of... scrape... That's a good idea-- that's much faster than drawing a line around with a pencil, isn't it?

Yes, and you don't have any lines on the cakes afterwards.

Happens a lot.

Yeah, that's much faster than the other way, isn't it?

Parchment paper is not absolutely necessary but it's a safe way.

This way the cake will always come out no matter... What.

No matter what.

So we can go back to our meringue now, and make sure.

Very important that the meringue is the last thing that is done because once the meringue is ready we need to fold it quickly together and place it into our pans.

So, the whites are ready and they're nice, soft peaks, so they're peaks.

Soft, and they're quite shiny.

Almost to medium, yes.

They're not whipped as much so they are a little shinier.

Okay, so they are plenty whipped.

If it's less, better, but if it were more it would be not a good idea.

We have our creamed mixture here.

And yolk mixture, and that's...

Yes, the butter, the egg yolks, the spice.

And then we fold in the meringue.

This is all very light and delicate at this point.

Yes, wonderful.

That's also very, very light for the stomach.

And still we have all the flavors.

And that's an important thing to not make the stomach work too hard but still being able to enjoy very delicious pastries.

And, very important the first third approximately... the first quarter... we can stir in quite... you know we can stir in quite... you know you don't have to worry too much because we need to adjust consistencies.

The meringue is very light; the creamed batter is rather rich.

If it separates a good trick is to take a little bit of the dry ingredients and that helps bind the mixture for the next step.

This seems to be a fascinating cake.

Poppy seeds and cake crumbs.

Okay, and you can take the rest of the meringue and fold it in, and this time, a little gentler.

Reaching all the way through the bottom, down the side through the center and up on the other side.

That's very important.

You don't want to deflate anything but you want it thoroughly mixed.

Very light.

Yeah.

And now when it's marbleized we can fold in the dry ingredients.

If you could give me a hand with those, I'd appreciate it.

Okay, you can add them and it's not very dangerous.

Since we don't have any flour we're not activating any proteins and because we sifted it there is no danger of making too many lumps.

Mm-hmm.

I think we can add the rest.

We really have to do... Now, we're folding to get that all in.

Now we add one tablespoon of espresso.

Very strong espresso.

Very strong.

The rest we'll...

Does that... ( laughs ) And a half-lemon, juice of half-lemon.

Just strain it in there Hmm, it's just as well you strained it, with all those seeds.

Very gently, we give it a few more folds and...

It's the strangest batter I think I've ever seen.

I hope it doesn't taste strange.

I have every trust in your taste.

A pan scraper is helpful just leveling it out a little before we put on the apricots.

Mm-hmm, that's a good idea.

Okay, and then we use that also to divide it into 12 portions.

In other words, this will serve 12 and each gets an apricot.

I'm placing the apricots now that we previously poached.

Okay.

We'll remove those.

That has a lovely smell of the... Maybe we could, could make a glaze maybe with the syrup later on just reducing it.

Mm-hmm, just boil it down.

Yes, now look, it is very separated.

It's already opened up, yes.

Again, the syrup can be reused for poaching it some more.

Use it in a fruit salad or really anything.

So, it's kind of asbestos finger, as you say.

You cut them in half.

Very gentle because they are very ripe.

I hope they come off the...

They are very ripe.

For this step we would not have to poach them for the baking part but then when we finish the cake it's very important to have poached fruit for appearance and flavor.

Okay.

I could help you with that, maybe?

Yeah.

They are still warm.

Of course, poaching helps them, too if they aren't ripe enough, doesn't it?

That's right.

And that goes in the oven for about 40 minutes.

40 minutes?

40 minutes, 35 to 40.

And what's the temp?

350 degrees.

350, okay.

That's beautiful, all baked.

It's still very slightly warm, isn't it?

It's, it's good to unmold it while it is still really warm.

And it tastes better slightly warm?

Absolutely.

And, uh, pretty much any one of the cakes that don't have cream or butter, uh... any cream inside taste better when they're at least room temperature.

We are going to unmold it by cutting around the sides just to make sure that it will loosen parchment paper, cardboard and... You can get those cardboards in the pastry supply.

They're awfully useful, aren't they?

Let's look at...

It came out perfectly.

Mm-hmm, just peel off the paper.

Slide it on the cardboard.

How do you get it out?

Oh, I see.

But we also can use a spring-form.

Oh, you can?

So, if that's kind of too scary then we can also use a spring-form pan.

Okay, so now we're going to place on the other 12 halves of apricots of the poached apricots.

Oh, that's a nice idea, yes.

Okay, so that bottom fruit is very well cooked and it enhances the flavor if you bake something with the fruit.

Don't it looks so nice, and for that...

It looks so nice, and...

It looks awfully good.

We add now the poached... And these were poached in that same delicious ginger syrup.

Yes, because they look, look nicer.

Oh, that's lovely.

You know, you'd never suspect there was a baked apricot underneath that.

That's very clever, I think.

The final touch as with a lot of Austrian pastries is that light sifting of powdered sugar.

That's right, it's always very light so you can see what's underneath, yes.

It's also very nice the powdered sugar also puts a little bit of a shine to the apricots.

And if you want to keep the cake longer it's probably a good idea to glaze it, glaze the apricots.

Oh, you mean with some apricot jam or something.

Yes, since we did try now.

You have to take it off that, now.

Yes, we've got to move it off the cardboard.

I slide it on.

Oh, that's lovely.

Ready to serve?

Ready to go.

Gently, we cut once across with the serrated slicer.

And I try to take out...

I see you're going through it with great gentleness.

I think whipped cream has kind of been treated like a sauce especially now with the new dairy farms that produce cream the way it was, once.

It's great to just utilize whipped cream.

Filled with cream cows.

Yes, a little bit of poppy seed that reminds of, reminds of what we did.

Isn't that called mit schlag?

Mit schlag... Schlag is "whipped cream."

With a beat.

That looks lovely.

And so, you want to try it?

I'll take a tiny bit there, so I can see what it's like.

Still a little bit of apricot here.

Mmm... mmm.

I've never tasted anything like that before at all.

I think this was a fascinating cake and it's so beautiful to serve.

I think there was apricots and then there's very special flavor.

I've never tasted anything at all like it before kind of that sweet, slightly acidness of the apricots and the...

It's really, I think, a masterpiece I would say... it's so beautiful.

And then having a really classical Viennese cake brought back to life again.

I think it's just a great achievement.

Thank you very, very much.

My pleasure.

Julia: Bon appétit!